Photo By Scott Beseler

(L-R) Miranda McGee, Jeremy Dubin and Sara Clark rehearse for CSC's current production of Macbeth.

Sprawled across Cincinnati Shakespeare Company's rehearsal room wall in huge Elizabethan letters are the words of playwright Samuel Beckett: "No Matter. Try Again. Fail Again. Fail Better." This is the collective mantra for a young company of actors who have consistently provided fine productions of the classics since 1994.

I recently asked several of CSC's actors, "What makes you people so unique? And why the recent name change -- from Festival to Company?"

A resident company, they explain, is a theatre in which artists work together on a long-term basis. CSC actors depend on eight-week or full-year contracts; many of them are currently in their eighth season together. Actors in this situation are relieved of the burden to constantly audition for "pickup" companies, in which there is little job security beyond the show for which they are hired.

Several actors describe the lack of trust inherent in commercial jobs. It's nerve-wracking, they say. You don't know anyone, and you are constantly trying to prove yourself. In a resident company, on the other hand, you get to know your fellow actors well.

Echoing the slogan on the rehearsal wall, third-year company member Kelly Mengelkoch has found that the closeness and acceptance at CSC gives actors the freedom to make mistakes and, ultimately, to make better artistic choices.

Each actor mentions the word "trust." The stage is a cagey beast, and there are many stories about the treacheries of actors upstaging one another, playing tricks on each other and generally being bad sports. But with professional actors, trust has more to do with the rehearsal process than the actual performance. Actors who trust one another can risk more in terms of character explorations because they know their colleagues won't hold it against them if they fail.

Jeremy Dubin, in his seventh season with the ensemble, told me about a warm-up game used to focus attention on one another. Actors form a circle and toss a ball to another actor who is holding his or her hands up. Then they must repeat the tossing pattern while moving about the space, eventually with three balls whizzing around the room simultaneously. If this sounds like child's play, that's because it is. Shakespeare's scripts are known as "plays," and those who act in them are "merely players."

Playing in the theater is not as easy as it sounds. Actors have lines to memorize, characters to get inside, other actors to work with, a director to satisfy, costumes and props to deal with and an audience to please. At CSC it's all of that -- and iambic pentameter, too. A small core of close-knit, dedicated actors working in concert can accomplish these tasks. That's how Shakespeare and his fellow actors originally worked at the Globe Theatre.

Dubin mentions that the casting possibilities for an actor in a small resident company are much better than in a pickup company, which invariably typecasts to save time and money. The diminutive Dubin has had many chances to play against type, including a superbly overbearing Benedick in Much Ado About Nothing, a performance nominated for a Cincinnati Entertainment Award in 2005. Dubin says he once went to a commercial audition for "short Jewish men" in Chicago. To his horror, he found himself in a room full of people who looked just like him.

The advantages of a resident company work to stretch the actors in their craft. But are there pitfalls? How do actors keep from feeling too safe, even complacent?

CSC's actors are aware of this problem, but they don't allow one another to get by with old tricks. They often call each other on them. Artistic Director Brian Isaac Phillips says that the trust borne of familiarity "allows us to take our craft to the next level."

Phillips says CSC now has an Actor's Equity Level 5 union contract and that it's a matter of pride that CSC pays all of their actors. CSC is something of a shoestring organization, but it manages to make the most of its resources. Approximately half of CSC's operating funds are box-office generated; the remainder comes from generous sponsoring agencies and individuals.

The resident ensemble company, Phillips mentions, is something of a vanishing breed in this country. While many regional theaters began that way, most have gone to jobbing in single shows at a time. CSC is one of a handful of resident theaters left, keeping company with the likes of Chicago's Steppenwolf and Milwaukee Rep.

Cincinnati Shakespeare Company has a distinctive character and flavor. I suspect most local residents don't know what a unique institution it represents, offering so many high-quality Shakespearean productions and other classics for schools and wider public audiences.

These dedicated artists are uniquely able to render Shakespeare in a way that's not only easy to understand but remarkably entertaining.